HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

I just LOVE HALLOWEEN!!  I think I love it more and more each year.  I like that we have several traditions and we manage to pull them off.  I got my traditional picture of EVERYONE in their costumes.  This is a big part of my Halloween.  Call me crazy, but I LOVE having this picture of what everyone dressed up as each  year.  It's what I look forward to.  I didn't, however, get the individual pictures I like to get, because I was worried about holding everyone up.  This is why I dislike doing things with other people.  I want to do things that I want to do, and not have to feel like I'm putting ANYONE out.  (well, except my own family of course, but they put up with me and know what to expect)  Chris and Stephanie wanted to bring Sophie trick-or-treating with us, so they were there, on time, and we were not quite ready yet.  We hadn't even gone to the Milligan's yet, which actually ended up being a wasted trip since they weren't there!!  What a bummer that was!!  I hope it wasn't anything too serious but I really can't imagine them missing Halloween trick-or-treaters!  So anyway!  Here they are, together, and then here are a few of the shots I did get:

Jack: Football (not a skeleton regardless of how skeletony his costume looked)

It was an easy costume, he totally didn't mind wearing it to ALL of the activities we attended where Luke's costume was required (Lukey insisted that he have his football with him :) )  Jack was so good all night.  He fell asleep early on, in Nate's arms, then slept on the top of the stroller for a block.  He probably would have stayed asleep on there all night if we hadn't stopped for hotdogs and chips
(and the ever-popular full-sized candy bars!) at the Lamb's house.  He woke up there and I carried him, he was fussing a little, through the next two streets before giving in and making a pit stop.  I was so thankful to see Stephanie Jones.  She let me in, we chatted while I fed Jack, and then she even provided a diaper for his much needed diaper change.  What a great place to stop I'm tellin' ya :).  He was pretty good after that.  We caught up with Nate and the kids and then shortly after that Stephanie and I brought all the little ones home.  Jack was happy to be home and get in some dry jammies.  We were so grateful for such a nice warm evening.  He wasn't cold at all!

Charity and Kelly: Two-headed Monster, Noah: Spiderman (and apparently I didn't get a picture of Sophie looking toward the camera... rats!)

Charity and Kelly were a couple of pros this year.  Charity had been invited to go with a friend even, but since her other half wanted to stay with the family, she declined the invitation.  I was glad :).  I wanted her with us!  I'm not ready to give them up to friends on Halloween yet.  I'm going to have to come up with some sort of bribe or heaven forbid, just be better than any other option I guess to keep them with me.  Charity seemed to want as much candy as possible.  They were a little ways ahead of us and she and Kelly were in the group that continued on when the weak ones couldn't go further :).  They looked so great in their costume.  It was fun to see them use something that was inspired by my childhood and costume with Wendy Olsen.  It's a fun one.

Noah was extremely motivated in the beginning.  He knew what he wanted!  He had a hard time holding his Ee-oh bag, but he didn't let that stop him!  He looked so cute running around, Spiderman style, shooting webs here and there.  He really got into it :)  I like that about him.  He did get tired, and came home early with us.  He was SO cute when we got home, he didn't skip a beat, dumping out his bag the second he walked in the door.  Cute kid.

Bradley: "the ghost from Scream 4" (I know I shouldn't care, but I hope nobody thinks we've actually seen that movie just because we bought the costume... it was kind of a last resort when we couldn't find any of the other things Bradley wanted to be)  Bradley LOVED the trick-or-treating.  He was all over that!  He was way ahead of us the whole time, and had to keep waiting up for us.  But he was the one that hit EVERY house.  It was fun to watch him get into it.  He was definitely on board for the extra street at the end :).

Erika: Tinkerbell

Erika was a newbie this year, she did it last year, but she was SO much more into it this year.  She had been so excited for trick-or-treating!  She did so good, going up to the doors, yelling "TRICK-OR-TREATING!!!", saying "thank you" for each piece of candy, and then telling me that she had said "thank you" :).  She's so adorable.  I loved watching her run around with her sweet little smile on her face! She sure had fun during the first half.  I think she got tired, or her sweet little feet (in her too small, Sunday shoes- I told her not to wear them, but she insisted) were just sore.  She was done when Stephanie and I started for home.  She had me carry her on my shoulders down the hill.  She LOVED her costume.  I was glad about that because she had gone back and forth between Belle and Tinkerbell for quite a while before settling on Tink.  She pointed out every little girl who was in a Princess costume, commented on the dresses and after a few I said, "Do you wish you were a princess too?" to which she gave a resounding, "NO!  I TINKERBELL!"  I love that!  I wish I could be more like that.  Just happy with what I am.

Oh, I did get one of just Luke!  yay!  Luke: Football Player  

Luke had a total blast!  He kept up with Bradley for most of it.  He wasn't done when the little kids were either, and even wore that helmet the whole time!  He was anxious to run into Carter, and once we did that, he was set!  He was a lot of fun to watch too.  It's crazy that my kids are big enough to trick-or-treat way ahead of us, and that they WANT TO!  I'm just glad they had fun.

And then for the sorting of the candy!

her cheesy-ball smile... haven't seen that in a while!

 Yeah, Dad, this is why you have seven kids!!  LOOK AT ALL THAT CANDY!!!

After the big kids got home, and we were all settled, I remembered that I'd told Grandpa Hatch that we'd come up to his house.  We invited him down instead :). Some of the kids even put their costumes back on just for Grandpa.  Fun stuff.  And of course they all shared with him too ;)

I couldn't believe how hard it was to look at all the candy and not eat any of it!!  I did splurge and eat one of the Butterfingers that Lukey gave me.  We share a similar favorite and he gave up his for me!!  That means A LOT!!!  Bradley gave me one of his candies as well.  I have such sweet boys.  They love their Mom and take such good care of me!!

It was tricky to get everyone in bed, but once they were there... they were OUT!  Such a fun, exhausting night!!  We all had a blast!

It was Kelly's night to stay up and this is what she did :) :

I love that she got him to hold the sucker in his hand :)  So funny

She even caught him sneezing :)

These all turned out SO CUTE!!  He's smiling in so many of them!

I like his hair inthis one :)

Kelly's so beautiful and picks such cute poses!  And look at that smile on Jack!!  LOVE THIS ONE!

After Kelly went to bed, Jack and I watched the Jazz game with Nate.

Already a Jazz fan :)

And that was our Halloween 2012.  Lots of good memories!

Lukey's Halloween Parade

On Halloween morning, the first graders get all dressed up in their costumes and parade around the cafeteria for all of us to see, then sing all of the Halloween songs they've been working on all month!  It's SO much fun!!  Luke was SO excited about it.  He looked so cute when he came in, with his arms all folded.  I'm not sure if he thought he needed to be reverent or what :), but I love it.

As he walked past Nate and the kids and I, he pointed to his head and mouthed to me that he had forgotten his helmet.  Big bummer.  For both of us :).  But at least he could still smile about it.  I think he was really disappointed.  There wasn't much we could do, so the show went on.  

I know a lot of these pictures look similar, but I just love the different facial expressions my little boy has.  He was so proud of himself, so happy to share his thing with us.  And I love that he knew all of the songs SO WELL!!  I mean, he's been singing these songs at home for weeks!  He knew them by heart, and did ALL of the actions.  It was ADORABLE!!  Something about Luke getting all grown up just makes me tear up.  I guess I do this about all of my kids, but this was another one of those moments when I realized he's not my baby Lukey anymore.

Here's Carter.

I'm still not REALLY sure how he felt about his Football Player costume.  I do know that he loves Jack a WHOLE lot to base his costume off of his :).  It is sweet.  I know he wanted to please me too, by using the idea I had said out loud while looking at Pinterest, but hopefully he wasn't too disappointed by it.  He sure looked cute in it, that's for sure :)

I'm really glad the school has these little programs.  I love that my kids get to do their thing and get all the attention for that moment.  He sure was cute.  I'm glad I remembered my camera AND the video camera.  Got it all on tape :)

Halloween Hatch Style

This year, while we were at the library to see the Firetrucks (yep that's the only reason we go to the library these days... darn fines!), Sarah had the fabulous idea to have a Halloween Party with the Hatch side!  They have one with her family, we have one with Nate's family, so why not have one together!  I was thrilled with the idea, and kind of took off with it.  Hopefully she didn't mind :).  We had a difficult time finding a day that all four of us sibs and our sigs (haha, get it, significant others) were available, so we settled on a Sunday.  I hesitated a lot, because I like our Sundays to be pretty mellow (aka: Holy), but this seemed like a very worthy cause, and in the words of one of my kids (wish I could remember who, they'll tell me): "it's not like we're going to watch tv or anything!"  HA!  That's RIGHT!  So we partied on :).  

Heidi and John brought their costumes and after changing out of their Sunday clothes (they had come to our Primary Program at church that day), they made their exciting entrance with a can of silly string!  Lots of fun!  Everyone loves Aunt Heidi and her antics :).  Heid was a bumblebee and John was a viking.  All the little boys and Erika dressed up for the party as well.  Charlie was Spiderman like Noah and Alvin was Captain America, I loved his costume!  

We had Taco Soup, Sarah's breadsticks (very yummy btw), and LOTS of treats and desserts.  Oh, I set out a bowl of grapes too, to kind of pretend like we had something else of some nutritional value :).  I made the eyeball cookies I was dying to make, Heidi brought brownies, Jauslin and Steve made cute orange cupcakes with little pictures on them.  It was a fun dinner :)

Then it was time for the games.  We did the candybar game, donut on a string game, and Scattergories.  I LOVE the pictures Heidi got of the donut game.  They're very fun to look at and possibly blackmail worthy :) for some people :)... jk.

Noah was licking his :)

lots of good shots of people's dental work and bats in the cave (how festive)

Charity had had a lot of practice the night before at the ward thing and so she was all set to whoop up on everyone.

This was a pretty exciting battle!  Steve pretty much kicked everyone's trash though.  He had his off the string just under 35 seconds!  Can you say RECORD?!!

I'm not sure what was going on here, with Alvin and the donut, but I think it's cute :)

yep, I challenged Nate to a duel 

and WON!!!  

(not the most flattering picture, I know, but PROOF!)

I think everyone had a pretty good time.  Things got really wild with Scattergories.  I wasn't sure who was still having fun at that point :), but it was really nice to get everyone together and have some fun.  It's definitely been a while.

Random Pictures

So, I think I might start a collection of pictures of Kelly with her freshly showered, wet hair, and Jack together.  Whenever Kelly stays up for her "10 minutes" at night, she likes to pose for pictures with Jack :).  So sweet!  

I just read the letter that Kelly wrote for Jack, to put in his baby book and MAN!  I just about cried!!  It is THE sweetest thing on the planet!  I wish I had permission to put it here, but I want to respect her privacy.  It is in his baby book, and I will be sure to give it to him later!  I LOVE that my Kelly is such a good big sister.  She sure has a big responsibility (as do all of the kids) to set an example, and I'm glad she has magnified that responsibility in her life!  

Nate took this at the neighbors' house when he was taking Don and Sherise's engagement pictures.  Kinda pretty right?

I just wanted to keep one of these for us.  I hope they don't mind :).  

I don't know why, but I think this is about the cutest thing I've ever seen.  This is the sign Erika made for HER door after watching Noah make a similar one for his door.  Noah's said, "No girls allowed" though.  Can you tell what Erika's means?  I LOVE IT!!!  (even if it is my kids trying to exclude each other... shame on them...)

This little guy has taken QUITE a while to smile, like REALLY smile at ya when you're trying to make him smile, and we are finally here!!  He likes the clicking tongue thing, I do that a lot to get him to smile.  Unfortunately these pictures do not capture the magnitude of his cuteness when he is smiling.  His little dimple on the right side of his face, just above the corner of his mouth is hardly even visible.  And I'm afraid I'm a little slow on the trigger, because his smiles are definitely bigger than this :).  But either way.... it pleases me so much to be able to see him looking happy :).  He is such an angel.

I was in such a hurry to snap the picture, I didn't get to focus it on Noah, but look at his sweet little face while we're driving through the car wash!  He is such a little boy :).  Easily pleased.  I like that about him.

Journaling

- We attended Bradley's first Pack Meeting on Tuesday, October 23, 2012.  It was a new thing for our family.  (at least since Eagle Mountain 4 years ago when I had the wolf den mother calling, and we would all go to pack meeting and run around like crazy people for an hour :) nobody remembers that except me ;))  I was so proud of Bradley, he stepped up and did some things at the beginning to help out and was very eager to be there.  It was fun to watch his excitement.  He received his first belt loop for Hiking and was recognized for achieving his Bobcat.  This is looking like a good beginning for our new little cub scout!  I can't wait to see how he does with this, and his involvement.  He is SO excited.  10-23-12

- On the 24th I drove down to Heidi's and we went out to dinner for her Birthday (a day late).  She had received a coupon in the mail for a free meal at Tucanos so that's where we went.  The food was amazing!  Of course.  It was just like Rodizio in my opinion... love that place!  They even had the fried bananas I liked at Rodizio.  We talked like crazy and ate like crazy until they finally kicked us out.... not really, but it sort of felt that way towards the end.  Jack did really good!  He was sleeping for the first part and then sat on my lap quietly for the rest of the time.  Good boy.  I loved being able to spend some much needed time with Heidi.  We went back to her place afterward and watched Modern Family with her roommates.  That was fun.

- Friday was our school's Halloween Carnival!  We had finalized most of the kids' costumes and the ones we hadn't... well... we faked.  I had had some trouble with Heidi's sewing machine that I was borrowing, since mine is broken, so a lot of my plans fell through, but we managed.  Everyone got dressed up, we went all out on the girls' hair and makeup, and we headed out only a few minutes past the time we had planned.  I was a little nervous to take everyone myself, it's a little bit of a zoo at the Carnival, but I had a little prayer in my heart and I feel like Heavenly Father blessed me with a lot of patience and even some fun :).  We went around to all the rooms, everyone got 8 tickets to start out, those went pretty fast even though Erika was super shy and didn't want to try anything.  Noah used most of hers I'm afraid.  The girls went off on their own a little bit which was sad for me :), but I'm so glad they got to go and have fun.  After we finished the ring toss, the boys all had their own two-liter bottle of soda to carry around and I thought it might be a good idea to go dump off some of our winnings, change Jack, and grab the money I had sitting in the car, so that we could get some more tickets and do a few more things.  We spent the rest of the time in the gym on the bouncy stuff.  I was able to sit off behind one of them and feed Jack.  It was nice and quiet for him :).  I think everyone had a really good time, and we did it with very few complications, if any.  It was great!  Now I know I can do a carnival with 7 kids.
10-26-12

- Saturday was a crazy day.  We went up to Meg's house for Enoch's birthday.  Bradley got to go with Enoch, Chris and some of his friends to Nicklecade!  He was SO excited!  Since it's a bit of a drive, the other kids and I stayed at Meg's and chatted it up.  It was a nice little break (for me, not Meg), to be able to sit and visit.  She was nice enough to feed my starving kids for whom I'd failed to bring food.  It was a lot of fun.
When we got home we hurried and got all dressed up in our costumes, again, and made our way up to the ward Chili Cook-off.  This is a fun tradition in our ward.  Everyone dresses up (we were seriously like the only ones not dressed up.  I need to invest in a wig, or hat or something fun to wear on Halloween, I feel like such a Halloween Scrooge not dressing up), we eat- Nate made his very first chili!!  He used sliced up sausage links, and his mango habanero sauce for heat with lots of beans... I was told it was fantastic, but it was a little too much for me (and eventually Jack).  Then the kids get to go around the rooms to play different games and win lots of little toys and candy :).  It's a lot of fun.  Our kids loved the donut on the string game.  And we had a lot of fun in the "Treat Walk" room.  Everyone ends up with handfuls of candy to shove in Mom's pocket.  Unfortunately the candy this year has been less than exciting for me.  I haven't eaten NEAR what I would have if I wasn't doing the "No Candy" thing, but I did slip up quite a bit this weekend.  I got better the day before Halloween and only ate ONE PIECE on Halloween!!!  This is some kind of Miracle, I'm telling you!!  Our kids were so upset when we had to go... well, mostly Noah.  He threw quite a fit.  This may be as a result of his new goal to stop sucking his fingers.  He's doing really well!  But I think it is taking a toll on him.  So anyway.  Fun night!  10-27-12